Jump to content
Chinese-Forums
  • Sign Up

Chinese words that use Chinese Characters in their names


Magnus1977

Recommended Posts

Flip Flops.

Intersection

The cross.

What do these things have in common? They all use characters in their names...

Flip flops on the mainland are called 人字拖

Intersections are called 十字路口

The Cross is called 十字架

In the name of the object... it tells you the character that it is supposed to represent.

Can you all think of anymore?? I would love to hear and see more that you can all think of !?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Here is a phrase that I'm fond of:

色字頭上一把刀

It literally means: "there is a knife above the character for lust"

Figuratively it's something like: "lascivous activities can lead to bitter consequences"

I even contributed it to CC-CEDICT ;)

Link to comment
Share on other sites

八字开, as in 衙门八字开,有理无钱莫进来.

Apart from specific words, you can also just say in normal speech that something looks like character such and such. Continuing on the 八字 theme, here's an example from 鲁迅:

夹袄也帖住了脊心,两块肩胛骨高高凸出,印成一个阳文的“八”字。 - describing how a very thin and sick person's shoulder blades were sticking out.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

To skylee: 八字 is not named after the shape of 八. To describe a birth date, two characters(天干、地支) are required to define either the year, the month, the date and the time. 2x4=8, so 8 characters total. Therefore it's called 八字。

I know that. 十字軍 was not named after the shape 十 either.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Join the conversation

You can post now and select your username and password later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.
Note: Your post will require moderator approval before it will be visible.

Guest
Click here to reply. Select text to quote.

×   Pasted as rich text.   Paste as plain text instead

  Only 75 emoji are allowed.

×   Your link has been automatically embedded.   Display as a link instead

×   Your previous content has been restored.   Clear editor

×   You cannot paste images directly. Upload or insert images from URL.

×
×
  • Create New...